Market Research Flashcards
The process of market research: 5 steps
Define problem
Design research plan
Collect data
Analyze data and develop insights
Determine an action plan
What does the “Define Problem Stage” Consist of?
Finding what information would be useful to you
Finding a problem with actionable results
Seeking to identify the root problem, not the symptoms of the problem (“declining sales”… “why are sales declining - poor customer service”
3 Basic Research Objectives
Exploratory
Descriptive
Causal
Exploratory Research Objective
To gather preliminary information that will help define problems and suggest hypotheses
Descriptive Research Objective
To describe problems, situations, or markets. Can gather information about people’s knowledge, attitudes, preferences, or buying behaviour.
“Which packaging do our customers prefer?”
Causal Research Objective
To test hypotheses about cause-and-effect relationships
When is recall of our brand better: when the logo is displayed at the beginning or the end of an ad?
Collecting Information: Secondary Data
Data already exists so is available quickly and at a relatively low cost. To be useful, should be relevant, accurate, current, and impartial
Often collected through marketing tools/analytics
Every time you scan an item in a grocery store (scatter data), did you buy items in pairs (toothpaste and floss)?
Primary Data
Consists of information collected for the specific purpose at hand; generate your own data instead of using existing data
Takes time and money to collect
Must be relevant, accurate, current, and unbiased
Research Techniques: Define Ethnographic and Observational
Observational: no interaction, people watching, PRIMARY DATA
Ethnographic: highly interactive, living with consumers in natural setting, costly, PRIMARY DATA
Research Techniques: Define Social Media
Blogs, Facebook polls, twitter, online communities, reviews
Considered SECONDARY DATA, no interaction
One risk with social listening is that some responses may not be accurate (crazy people)
What are risks of taking data from focus groups
Peer pressure/social influence:
- Agreeing with, wanting to please the moderator
- Moderator too influential/overbearing
Research Techniques: Define Projective
Good for understanding consumers’ motivation, emotion, but costly
Psychological perspective: interpretive, Word Association Tests, Sentence Completion tests, Drawing
Research techniques: Surveys
Generally collect DESCRIPTIVE data, flexible
Ask people questions about attitudes, knowledge, preferences, buying habits
Research Techniques: Experiments
manipulate CAUSE variables, measure the EFFECT varaibles and hold the CONTROL variables constant
Quasi-experimental design
An experiment that seeks to identify a cause-effect relationship, but cannot control for all variables
Most often, there is not random assignment into test groups
